Cataloguing: It's not just for experts any more
What is it with vendor cataloging lately?
Full processing cataloging options are one-size-fits-all - except one size only fits some. Evidently those are folks who aren't too worried about matching sources like...Library of Congress. Why don't vendors just use the CIP??? In fact, why don't they use their own entries?
Yesterday I had the thrill of replacing the Dewey supplied in the vendor's MARC with the entry LC thought might be fun to use. Just for the heck of it I looked at the entry on the vendor's site from which I'd ordered. It did match LC! They didn't even check their own stuff!
This is particularly apparent when a book is biographical, but not primarily a biography. (The book in question is about a person's sports career leading to and including a trip to the Olympics - clearly centered on sports. LC thought 796.812. The vendor supplied 92.) Lately anything that refers to a person's life gets a 92. Maybe I missed something in the cataloging course; maybe I missed something in working in the cataloguing department at HugeU for years. Sure, there are often several valid ways to catalogue a book. However, the object of the exercise seems to be twofold: find the main emphasis of the book AND (drumroll) figure out the best entry to serve the needs of the patrons looking for the book.
I can understand that when I make quirky decisions based solely on the needs of my admittedly small user population, I need to just make the local authority decision and call it a day. However, when I'm following AACR2 and generally accepted cataloguing protocol, as evidenced by agreement by other libraries (such as the Library of Congress), I think I should see that process reflected in the cataloguing I receive from vendors.
Further, when I talk to the vendor and specifically request specific protocols, I damn well expect to get them! One vendor has really tried to accommodate this - with hilarious results. They have starting cataloging my orders individually and tried to go with the CIP - but when they remove the 92 and replace it with the right Dewey #, they never remember to replace the letters beneath - so I get the Dewey # with the first three letters of the subject's surname. At least they try.
I got a call from one cataloguing department head of a service used by one of the vendors - she actually called me dear as she condescendingly tried to explain why I should follow their standards. She even said they've whipped off a (probably snotty) letter to the Library of Congress to explain why LC's cataloguing department needed to change their protocol! Damn! This service is being phased out by the publisher - they're finding it's cheaper to hire their own people than to use the service because they make a lot of their profit from the processing purchases - and a lot of us threatened to stop buying the package.
So Monday I'll go back to checking the MARC record for every single book I receive and making changes and additions to each record as needed. It's still faster than doing the whole thing myself - but irritating nonetheless. The order I'm working on now is about 400 books - small when you have a cataloguing department; not so small when you ARE the cataloguing department.
Full processing cataloging options are one-size-fits-all - except one size only fits some. Evidently those are folks who aren't too worried about matching sources like...Library of Congress. Why don't vendors just use the CIP??? In fact, why don't they use their own entries?
Yesterday I had the thrill of replacing the Dewey supplied in the vendor's MARC with the entry LC thought might be fun to use. Just for the heck of it I looked at the entry on the vendor's site from which I'd ordered. It did match LC! They didn't even check their own stuff!
This is particularly apparent when a book is biographical, but not primarily a biography. (The book in question is about a person's sports career leading to and including a trip to the Olympics - clearly centered on sports. LC thought 796.812. The vendor supplied 92.) Lately anything that refers to a person's life gets a 92. Maybe I missed something in the cataloging course; maybe I missed something in working in the cataloguing department at HugeU for years. Sure, there are often several valid ways to catalogue a book. However, the object of the exercise seems to be twofold: find the main emphasis of the book AND (drumroll) figure out the best entry to serve the needs of the patrons looking for the book.
I can understand that when I make quirky decisions based solely on the needs of my admittedly small user population, I need to just make the local authority decision and call it a day. However, when I'm following AACR2 and generally accepted cataloguing protocol, as evidenced by agreement by other libraries (such as the Library of Congress), I think I should see that process reflected in the cataloguing I receive from vendors.
Further, when I talk to the vendor and specifically request specific protocols, I damn well expect to get them! One vendor has really tried to accommodate this - with hilarious results. They have starting cataloging my orders individually and tried to go with the CIP - but when they remove the 92 and replace it with the right Dewey #, they never remember to replace the letters beneath - so I get the Dewey # with the first three letters of the subject's surname. At least they try.
I got a call from one cataloguing department head of a service used by one of the vendors - she actually called me dear as she condescendingly tried to explain why I should follow their standards. She even said they've whipped off a (probably snotty) letter to the Library of Congress to explain why LC's cataloguing department needed to change their protocol! Damn! This service is being phased out by the publisher - they're finding it's cheaper to hire their own people than to use the service because they make a lot of their profit from the processing purchases - and a lot of us threatened to stop buying the package.
So Monday I'll go back to checking the MARC record for every single book I receive and making changes and additions to each record as needed. It's still faster than doing the whole thing myself - but irritating nonetheless. The order I'm working on now is about 400 books - small when you have a cataloguing department; not so small when you ARE the cataloguing department.
